Wednesday, June 29 2016

It has been an interesting few days in genealogy-land. I'm preparing for my long visit to Ireland next winter and working on a research plan to get the most out of visits to the National Library of Ireland and the Archives, Manuscript library and other sites.

To decide what to include on the list of goals I allowed myself some diversions from the direct family lines for a while. Sometimes you have to go sideways to go forward. I know that many of the families who lived near Arthur and Eliza Byrne in Throoptown, Ontario had the same names as families who surrounded the Byrnes in Coolross, before they emigrated. How did they all choose the same area to settle? Were some families here first? Were some here from the time of the building of the Rideau Canal?

I might not find the answers to those questions - I'm easily distracted and diverted. You'd only have to take a look at my pile of papers and files to know that I've sometimes, well maybe often, gone off madly in all directions.

For a while - well a couple of hours - I was looking in the Gehan/Gahan connection. One of Arthur's children, Arthur Jr, married Eliza Gahan. After raising their family in Canada, and having the senior Arthur and Eliza living with them, they sold their land and moved to Ogdensburg, NY. It's just across the St Lawrence River which divides Ontario Canada from New York State. The borders were very porous back in the late 19th century. There was work to be had working on the Great Lake steamers and other working boats and Arthur Jr answered the siren call, as did many of his siblings and extended family.

I made NO progress at all other than to find a few records supporting what I already knew of the Gahans. So, I moved on to the Thorpes. Two Byrne sisters married two Thorpe brothers. One couple remained in Ontario and the other moved to Monroe County, New York. Their family had come from Croneyhorn townland, Hot Pot Lane to be specific (yes, that's really the name). Gabriel Thorpe, father of these boys, had married Nancy (Ann) Byrne in the Tomacork Parish, County Wicklow. So far no indication of a connection with our Byrne family.

I pored over records of the Thorpes and found a few more names and parts of more recent generations. That was on Saturday.

Sunday brought an unexpected email from a man on the Isle of Wight. He had found an old book that had been presented to a Catherine Thorpe as a prize for diving in 1908. It appears to have been affiliated with a school in Chelsea, England. Being curious he googled her name and came upon a link to the item I had written about our Byrne folks in Throoptown. Down the list of descendants were some Thorpes. My email address had been attached to the article so he wrote.

I had not thought about the Thorpes in months and the day after I start looking into them, this email pops into my inbox. As it turns out, I can't seem to find any connection to Thorpes in England, although it is an English name. Maybe our Thorpes descended from the English who pretty much took over Ireland so long ago. Maybe they just left England and settled in Ireland for their own reasons.

Well I decided to do some investigating as my previous days' record searching had led me to some Thorpes who remained in Canada - descendants of Henry Thorpe and Margaret Byrne. I began to wonder if there were any Thorpes still around that area.

I went online to Canada411.ca which is the best source of phone numbers for Canadians who have landlines. Lo and behold there was one Thorpe in Prescott and about half a dozen in Brockville. I called the one in Prescott but he was sick in hospital and his wife didn't really seem up to a great deal of conversation so I just wished him well.

The first name in Brockville was my next target. There I got a warm welcome and the next day, Tuesday by now, I drove to Brockville as previously planned, to do a little more searching - but not for Thorpes. I diverted to the home of the Thorpes I had spoken with but it doesn't seem like we are related after all. Their ancestor had arrived in Canada decades before ours, and he was Protestant. He did have an interesting life though. I left what I knew of my Thorpes with this family.

Now I have to gather the courage to call some of the other Thorpes. It's a bit hazardous and can upset people. Cold calls are usually from telemarketers and I'm anything but. Tomorrow I might venture into the phone realm again - but I'll prepare a better introduction.

The reason for my trip to Brockville was to search for information on the Fennells and Fitzpatricks. I have managed to locate the Fennell ancestors in the townlands of Barrowhouse and Monebrock in County Kildare. The Fitzpatricks were according to family information, from County Cavan. Patrick was my great great grandfather. His obituary stated that he had come from County Cavan, first to Bytown which is now Ottawa. Subsequently he arrived and settled in Brockville. I guess Annie Fennell caught his eye because they married in 1852 and became pillars of the farming and church community.

The record of their marriage is in the family bible, held by cousin Mike Whitten in Northern Ontario. It simply gives November 1852 as the date. No parents names are listed. Without the names of Patrick's parents, and no mention of a townland or even a parish, in Ireland there is little hope of finding the right folks. Maybe we are related to some Fitzpatricks who are still there, but unless some obscure source of information comes to light, I'll probably never find out.

There was no mention in the newspaper of that month and year. Land records don't have Patrick's name which means that in 1861 when the agricultural census included concession and lot numbers,  he was just renting. Without knowing the concession it would take an incredible length of time to pore through all of the land record books to see if he ever bought any land.

He did however, leave a will which was probated. A copy of that will is in the land office. To see it means another trip to Brockville. Who knows what I might learn there - perhaps the location of his land. Most wills don't mention parents of the adult deceased but maybe in a couple of weeks I'll have some time on my hands and desire to incur temporary vision issues by poring over that microfilm.

I think I'll leave the Thorpes and Gahans alone for the time being. I know where to go in Ireland to find the home place of the Fennells. That's one more ancestral family about whom there is probably more information to be found.

My brick walls in Ireland, beyond the Fitzpatricks, are now down to the McGraths of Kilkenny, the Loughnanes of Tipperary, the Walsh and Macdonald families of who knows where. Then there are the Mahers and the Kanes. And oh yes, the "other" McGraths. The Kehoes keep peeking out here and there but I have no idea if I'm being teased or there might be someone behind a glass of Guinness who knows something of the Kehoe heritage and is willing to chat.

For now I'll drift off with visions of evenings in a pub somewhere in rural Ireland when the ghosts of my ancestors all arrive with stories to tell.